Today's News

During the Christmas season, and on our birthdays/anniversary (all the same day), my wife, Carol, and I like to spend a few days in Gatlinburg. Our getaway place is the Riverhouse Motor Lodge on the river, where we have stayed for many years.

Our South Knoxville furniture friends, Jerry and Mickey Pease, joined us for our latest visit.

They looked forward to our “Out to Lunch” visit to the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Restaurant, on the Parkway at Airport Road, next to the Convention Center.

The East Tennessee Region Emergency Preparedness Program and the Roane County Health Department have been recognized by the National Association of County and City Health Officials for its ability to plan for, respond to and recover from public health emergencies.

The East Region Emergency Preparedness Program demonstrated these capabilities by meeting the comprehensive preparedness benchmarks required by Project Public Health Ready, a unique partnership between NACCHO and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

First reading of a Rockwood ordinance creating a permit requirement for alarm systems in the city and charging a penalty for excessive false alarms passed unanimously last week.

“We have times where we get swamped by false alarms,” said Rockwood Police Chief Danny Wright.

“A lot of times we’re going to a house or business or the fire department is answering them where we have no idea who a responsible party is, whether we need to make entry if it is a medical alarm or not, somebody to get a-hold of,” Wright said.

Several zoning resolutions were on the agenda at last month’s Roane County Commission meeting.

J. Baker Hamilton owns 162 acres of woodland along Roane State Hwy. across from Roane County Park. He wants to market the property as commercial and requested that it be rezoned from low-density residential to highway commercial.

The planning commission approved the request in December. The commission approved it at the January meeting.